It added: “That we are consistently at the bottom in every league speaks volumes on the incompetence of our governmental health administrations in matters of preventive medicine and encouraging healthy lifestyles.”

After Malta, the biggest proportions of obesity were found in Estonia, Latvia, Hungary and the United Kingdom, who all had more than one fifth of adults in this category.

Romania the least obese

Romania looked in the best shape, EU-wide, with just 9.4 percent of adults obese, followed by Italy, Netherlands, Belgium and Sweden.

How does the EU compare with the US?

The EU average for obesity – defined as anyone with a body mass index of more than 30 – was 15.9 percent or around one-in-six in 2014.
To put the EU’s value in context the least obese state in the USA, Colorado, had a rate of 20.2 percent. Four states had obesity rates of more than 35 percent – Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi and West Virginia.

More than half of adults in EU considered ‘overweight’

Overall 46.1 percent of adults in the EU were considered a normal weight, with 51.6 percent classified overweight, consisting of those categorised overweight, pre-obese and obese. A total of 2.3 percent of adults were underweight.

Is the obesity problem getting worse?

Comparable data for previous years is limited to 2008. But, of the 17 countries for which there are figures, only three saw their obesity problem get worse, compared with 2014: Romania, Latvia and Bulgaria.

Slovakia, Cyprus and the Czech Republic made the best progress on obesity if you compare data for 2008 and 2014.
Slovakia improved its figures by around seven percent, moving from having nearly one-in-four adults obese eight years ago, to one-in-six in 2014.